Foreign powers have been meddling in the Congo ever since the Belgian king Leopold II sent Stanley off in pursuit of the region's enormous mineral wealth. And central Africa's crises and conflicts have been charted by novelists and historians from Joseph Conrad to John Le Carré. Just as Conrad was instrumental in confronting westerners with the brutality of colonialism, writers such as Philip Gourevitch have been crucial in highlighting the instability and chaos which have swept through the region since the Rwandan genocide of 1994. Here we gather together some of the best writing about the region, both fiction and non-fiction.

King Leopold's Ghost by Adam Hochschild (1999) Hochschild struggles against the "great forgetting" of Belgium's exploitation of the Congo with this corrective history of Leopold II's bloody empire. He tells how the Belgian king sanctioned the death of somewhere between five and eight million people from 1878 until his death in 1910, describes the brutal methods employed by his agents, and traces the roots of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness.

In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz by Michela Wrong (2000) A vivid study of the rise and fall of the president who looted the Congo, Mobutu Sese Seko. Wrong mixes horror stories and a well-researched history of Mobutu's regime with an account of ordinary life in a country plunged into economic crisis.

Africa: A Modern History by Guy Arnold (2006) A groundbreaking history of the continent since the second world war, which charts the break-up of colonial rule, the spread of dictatorship and recent conflicts over borders and mineral resources. Arnold examines the parts played by Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Uganda and Rwanda in what he calls Africa's Great War in the Congo, showing how foreign companies and governments continue to this day in the despoliation begun by Leopold II.

We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families by Philip Gourevitch (1999) A searing analysis of the 1994 Rwandan genocide which unleashed a wave of instability in the Congo region. Gourevitch combines interviews with victims and their killers and his own first-hand accounts of travelling around the region in the aftermath of the Interahamwe killings. He also builds a powerful case against the international community, whose inaction made it the unwilling accomplice of Hutu power.

Congo Journey by Redmond O'Hanlon (1996) The naturalist and travel writer sets off on an intrepid river journey in search of the legendary Mokele-mbembe. O'Hanlon confronts natural perils, corruption and poverty with his trademark mixture of gallows humour and laconic understatement, offering a perspective on the Congo focusing more on the people and animals who live there than the region's troubled politics.

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (1902) This semi-autobiographical novella tells the story of an English ferry-boat captain, Charles Marlow, who travels up the Congo river on the trail of the tyrannical Kurtz. Accused by Chinua Achebe of racism in its dehumanising portrayal of Africans, Conrad's novel remains a striking exploration of the schism between the western ideal of civilisation and the reality of western imperialism.

The Catastrophist by Ronan Bennett (1998) Bennett confronts the question of an artist's role in a time of conflict as an Irish novelist follows his lover to Leopoldville on the verge of independence in 1959.

Johnny Mad Dog by Emmanuel Dongala (2005) The story of two teenagers growing up in the shadow of west Africa's civil wars, the expatriate Congolese novelist Emmanuel Dongala paints a vivid picture of the struggle to survive in difficult times.

Murambi, the Book of Bones by Boubacar Boris Diop (2006) The Senegalese novelist Boubacar Boris Diop tells the story of a history teacher who returns to Rwanda after the 1994 genocide to try to make sense of the tragedy which engulfed his family, and to write a play about it.

The Mission Song by John Le Carré (2006) Le Carré sets an African Candide loose in the middle of a preposterous plot hatched by a bunch of former public schoolboys to deliver democracy to the Congo via the barrel of a gun.

African Psycho by Alain Mabanckou (2007) The first of expatriate Congolese novelist Mabanckou's six novels to be translated into English, African Psycho follows an inept murderer as he careers through the chaos and confusion of a shantytown called He-Who-Drinks-Water-Is-An-Idiot.